Following the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan in March of 2011, Japan shut down all of it nuclear power plants. Abe, the new Prime Minister of Japan has targeted the domestic nuclear industry as being critical to the economic expansion of Japan, both internally and as a source exportable technology. Despite widespread public opposition, Abe has pushed forward to restart Japan's idle nuclear power reactors. Draconian laws have been passed to prevent the media from departing from the official government line on the need for and safety of nuclear power in Japan.
In mid 2012, a feed-in tariff system was enacted which requires Japan's ten utilities to purchase electricity made from solar, wind, geothermal, mini-hydro and biomass sources from private firms. Many companies rushed to take advantage of the guaranteed fixed price per kilowatt hour provided by the feed-in tariff. There were many more applications under the program than anticipated by the central government. The national government has approved almost a million and a half projects under the new system. Around half of these projects focus on small rooftop solar projects that produce less than ten kilowatts of electricity. Over a thousand projects have been approved that produce more than two megawatts of power.
Last September, Kyushu Electric Power Company (KEPC) announced that they would "no longer sign contracts with most companies that were supplying renewable energy." The reason given was that the KEPC transmission network could not handle the estimated load if KEPC actually purchased electricity from all the renewable energy providers that it had contractual arrangements with. Four more of the ten utilities in Japan quickly announced the same policy that KEPC adopted. This action by the utilities caused many supporters of renewable energy to complain that this would reduce Japan's move to renewable energy sources.
Recently, in response to the feed-in tariff situation, an agency of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry issued a revision of the feed-in tariff system rules for the national electrical grid. Supporters of the revisions say that government intervention will " ensure safe and stable supply of all forms of electricity by helping to prevent renewable energy from overloading the grid and causing blackouts." Critics of the new rules say that the real reason for the revisions is to limit the production of renewable energy so that when the nuclear power plants are brought back online, there will sufficient grid capacity to accept the power that they generate.
Under the original feed-in tariff system, companies could sign contracts to supply electricity to the utility grids but they did not have a deadline set for construction. Obviously, some firms opted to delay construction in hopes that the cost of construction would fall and they would make a greater profit. The new rules call for the setting of deadlines for construction. If a company misses the deadline, it might lose the right to access the utility transmission network. Originally, the feed-in tariff system limited output of renewable energy sources to a maximum of thirty days a year. The new rules call for limits that are calculated by the hour. This will provide flexibility and insure that there is sufficient grid capacity to accept available energy.
The government has said that it wants to reduce Japan's reliance on nuclear power but the new feed-in tariff rules are based on the assumption that Japan's idle nuclear power plants will be brought back on-line and need grid capacity that could be supplied by renewables.
